What is the best app for planning a road trip?

[bmwhitetx]

Next one north of that was always the Tesla chargers at Abbott Travel Center near Abbott, Tx on I35 south of Dallas. Want to go through Dallas on a full charge.
Next stop both ways was always the Tesla one at Gainesville at the little strip center with convenience store and road construction there.

I have used the Abbott one - but it's V3 and thus short cables. Just a little further north is the new HIllsboro Buc-ees with V4 style cables and magic docks. Also has Merceds-Benz chargers on the other side of the lot similar to Temple Buc-ees.
Also Lorena (between Temple and Waco) is nice if you want to avoid Buc-ees - they are V4 also.

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[potato]

I used the Tesla App for a trip and every time I got to 80% it stopped and told me I was done. Is there a setting somewhere that won't let me go to 85/90 (assuming I am still eating my hamburger at the A&W next door) rather than stop? Note: I had Plug & Charge turned off so that it would do the payment via Tesla vs. Ford.

Seems odd. On my truck the default is 90%.

You can change it in Charge Settings in the truck. It's a one time change though. And watch out for congestion fees; if the Tesla station is busy and charges congestion fees, then stopping at 80% is what you want.

 

[Ejunge]

I ran your trip using ABRP with Tesla superchargers as the preference. Start at 100%.

Red Oak, Tx. 19% to 70%. 29 min. I would go to 80-85 every time.

Denison, Tx. 30% to 77%. 30 min.

Henryetta, OK. 21% to 39%. 9 min.

Tulsa, OK. 20% - 69%. 28 min.

Joplin, Mo. - S. Main St. 20% - 41%. 11 min.

Springfield, Mo - Arrive with 10%.

Pick a motel with a charger that you can get a discount to for joining the charging companies' club for a month and not renewing.

This has extra stops over the Tesla app and still doesn't want you to get there on very much of a charge. My previous trip plan with Tesla app allowed for a round trip of almost the same except for the last leg to Austin.

I used ABRP in my phone on my trip to San Antonia for an over all idea. It also gave me exact street addresses for Tesla stations to put into ford navigation which was before I got android auto with google maps working.

Once I was on the ABRP app and ran the trip (and the same in Tesla), I just got on the open map search showing all available charging stations to pick the next one that I wanted to stop at based upon me charging to 80 - 85 - 90% at stops.

My trip to San Antonio had me charging in Austin both ways.

Next one north of that was always the Tesla chargers at Abbott Travel Center near Abbott, Tx on I35 south of Dallas. Want to go through Dallas on a full charge.
Next stop both ways was always the Tesla one at Gainesville at the little strip center with convenience store and road construction there.

Next stop going north I would get to Guthrie, Ok which is just north of I44. You may want to stop at Norman or Edmond before getting on I44.

My next trip to Dallas, will have Guthrie and Gainesville stops plus the motel in Dallas. If I was going to Austin, then I'd stop at Abbott Travel Center as you can eat there as well. The chargers are across from the fuel pumps and handy to everything unlike some of the other remote charging locations.

Thanks for this... Yeah, I will look at ABRP- but the OKlahoma City Route- while it would be the easiest drive- is out, because I have to make a stop in Talahina. ButI used to live in Edmond, OK (just south of Guthrie) so I know that area REALLY well- maybe a good Drive home though..

But thank you, I didnt know this tool existed..

 

[RickLightning]

I used the Tesla App for a trip and every time I got to 80% it stopped and told me I was done. Is there a setting somewhere that won't let me go to 85/90 (assuming I am still eating my hamburger at the A&W next door) rather than stop? Note: I had Plug & Charge turned off so that it would do the payment via Tesla vs. Ford.

I have never had a charger end my session at 80%.

 

[majorgearhead]

This is a lot of toil. Go to PlugShare, cross reference with star charts, do the Hokey Pokey and get totally friggen fed up with EV’s.

Save yourself the toil and extra expense for app subscriptions (looking at you ABRP).

First for the least amount of toil with broken or non-existent chargers, just use Tesla. Get a subscription if you are going on a long trip. This will save money. Lots of it over EA and others.

For Nav:
If 24-25 and you have the Tesla supercharger update use native nav. You can tell if you have an option to toggle the NACS connector in your nav settings.

If older than that and you:
- Use iPhone then just use Apple Maps
- Use Android then just use Google Maps

Even though many poo poo it, I highly suggest the native nav, especially if you have the updates for superchargers in it. This is the gold standard where you can tell it the preferred charging network and it will properly route you to those and tell you how long to charge. Apple and Android do this as well with varying integration and niceties. The key is native nav will precondition which is big in the winter. Android Auto, used to but has been broken for at least 3-4 integrations of Google Maps Apple Maps offers the most basic of all routing and no preconditioning, though the interface is nice.

I have nearly 60k EV travel miles on multiple EVs so this is my qualified opinion. Take it for what it’s worth.

 

[DavidS]

A few notes on ABRP, 1) if you don’t use an OBD with live data, you need to make sure you enter your current state of charge(this is a real pain if you’re trying to drive at the same time) and 2) ABRP can sometimes reroute you without any or much notice.
I use ABRP for route planning and as long as it is behaving for the trip as well but frequently switch to Apple Maps while driving. ABRP definitely gives you the most flexibility in setting preferences to optimize your trip but occasionally I see it make just really suboptimal choices for charging location, like driving miles off the highway to meet a distance cadence instead of adjusting distance to match highway adjacent charging.

 

[roddiaz1]

I like Plug Share website for the actual planning, but on the road I like to have ABRP up on the screen.
With the Plug Share I actually sometimes print screenshots and use them as “maps”. For those that don’t know, “maps” are large pieces of paper, usually folded, that have pictorial representation of the roads and terrain one intends to traverse.
I’ll pick one, two or three charging stations that I suspect I might want to stop at. This gives me some flexibility in case my miles per KWh is higher or lower than projected.
At any rate, that’s what works for me.

 

[FloridaMan655321]

I like Plug Share website for the actual planning, but on the road I like to have ABRP up on the screen.
With the Plug Share I actually sometimes print screenshots and use them as “maps”. For those that don’t know, “maps” are large pieces of paper, usually folded, that have pictorial representation of the roads and terrain one intends to traverse.
I’ll pick one, two or three charging stations that I suspect I might want to stop at. This gives me some flexibility in case my miles per KWh is higher or lower than projected.
At any rate, that’s what works for me.

Yup, I forgot to mention this. With the backup routes I will take a screenshot in put it in Apple Notes.

Also, I get what everyone is saying with ABRP, but it's not the best for planning IMO. Plugshare really has a fantastic tool when creating a route. Allows you to put in how many miles you want to drive, choose the chargers, and get a nice bubble to see how far you might want to drive. I generally create a few paths just because it's so easy.

 

[DNap4]

Does ABRP allow you to switch a charging stop with another? I look at the cost for each charger on my route with PlugShare and decide where to stop. When I plug in a destination in ABRP it only selects Tesla Superchargers. Even with the membership plan that saves money, some other superchargers along the same route may be cheaper and I want to stop there instead of the one populated by ABRP. When I add a different charging stop, it doesn’t recalculate the remaining stops to the destination.
Anyone have luck on doing this?

 

[potato]

For those that don’t know, “maps” are large pieces of paper, usually folded, that have pictorial representation of the roads and terrain one intends to traverse.

I was just thinking about this on my last drive. You'd get the paper map from a gas station or AAA/CAA if you planned ahead. Look up addresses in the phone book. Look up street names in the index around the edge then you had to find the street in the grid square. In just a few decades, thanks to GPS and smartphones, we've made that process so much easier. People probably can't imagine life before Google now.

 

[RickLightning]

Does ABRP allow you to switch a charging stop with another? I look at the cost for each charger on my route with PlugShare and decide where to stop. When I plug in a destination in ABRP it only selects Tesla Superchargers. Even with the membership plan that saves money, some other superchargers along the same route may be cheaper and I want to stop there instead of the one populated by ABRP. When I add a different charging stop, it doesn’t recalculate the remaining stops to the destination.
Anyone have luck on doing this?

I change chargers all the time.

 

[bc1]

I have used the Abbott one - but it's V3 and thus short cables. Just a little further north is the new HIllsboro Buc-ees with V4 style cables and magic docks. Also has Merceds-Benz chargers on the other side of the lot similar to Temple Buc-ees.
Also Lorena (between Temple and Waco) is nice if you want to avoid Buc-ees - they are V4 also.

I had stopped and recharged at Abbott. The trick on the short cords is to nose in between two chargers so your charge port is even with one cord. Then I usually get out and check while nosing up there. Plenty of room without worrying about hitting one. They are never that full when I'm there anyway.

I did go on to Bucees and saw the new chargers but I don't know if they were working back in October. Ended up getting some sack time in the parking lot though.

If going though Talihina, Ok, then I'd still look at Abbott but go on to Hillsboro Buc-ees as a first choice. Then consider any of Royce City, Greenville, and/or Paris as the final one in Texas to get you to Talihina. After that you have Poteau, Ok and then Fort Smith, AR. After Fort Smith it's all interstate to Springfield and plenty of Tesla Supercharger possibilities.

After Paris, Tx, Hugo, Ok has a Blink charger at the Walmart. Talihina and the rest of the that area is covered by Francis Energy. Talihina has a 40 amp slow charger but maybe you have someone you are visiting with the right outlet if you have the adapters for the ford charger that would get you to Poteau to the Tesla supercharger.

FYI. I have all the apps. ABRP, Plugshare, Tesla, Ford, Waze, etc. Don't hurt to have the charging ones as well, Chargepoint, ElectrifyAmerica, EvGo, Ev Connect. Tesla saves around 20 cents a kwh from a typical mid 50s cents per kwh down to mid 30s cents per kwh. At 13 bux a month, that pays for 65 kwh based upon the roughly 20 cents savings difference which is less than one charge at a commercial charger. I've used Francis energy and they are close to 60 cents per kwh.

On a long trip I also run with two map apps going. Google maps though Android Auto has my overall full length trip laid out in it so I can track it all the time. You can use Waze or whatever. Before I got Android Auto working I just had it going on my phone. Then I used the Ford Nav app for guidance to get me to the specific address of the supercharger or motel or wherever I may want to stop and it is much more useful when going through places like Dallas, Austin, San Antonio, etc. with all the multilane freeways and exits involved. Ford Nav has a better look ahead so I can see if I'm taking the right exit or not when there are like 3 exits all in a row, IMHO.

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